*Rhea's POV*

Just by looking at Dylan, you could easily tell that he was no small person. Standing right behind him, though, I was still taken aback by how much he towered me. With him in front of me, I was completely hidden from the jocks' sight. And even though a part of me knew that he had done this to defend me, a more irrational part of me felt the urge to flight.

"What did you call us, Klebold?" I heard the jock ask, and I knew then that Dylan had failed to intimidate them.

"Common Rick, let's not get into trouble," One of his friends said, looking around for teachers.

"Do you have tampons stuck so far up your ears that you can't hear or are you simply retarded? He called you piles of shit," a friend of Dylan said when Dylan didn't respond, rising from where he was sitting at the table. He was notably smaller than Dylan and had short brown hair. I had seen him around before as well, he was a senior too.

A moment of heavy silence followed and, if I had thought there had been commotion moments ago, I was about to learn otherwise. It began with Dylan stumbling back hard against me, making me be thrown back to the floor by the sudden impact, and then fists were thrown. I wasn't sure who the first to throw a fist had been, but when I looked up from where I was on the floor, Dylan and his friend were already caught in a fist fight.

"Eric, Dylan!" Their friends rose to their feet and hurried to try to stop the fight.

"Stop the fight right now!" An angry voice shouted over the body of students that had gathered around the fight. We all turned to see our Psychology teacher, Mr. Brown, make his was toward where we were, followed by our English teacher, Mr. Adams.

One of the jocks, the taller blond one I had thrown the soup to hadn't had enough, though, as he threw Dylan one last punch to the abdomen, making him curl over as he gasped for air.

"That's it! I want you all at the Principal's office right now!" Mr. Brown ordered, and that's when the fight really stopped. One of Dylan's friends hurried to me and helped me up. Until then I hadn't realized I was still on the floor. Thankfully, as he helped me up, nothing hurt too bad. I wasn't sure if it was the same for Dylan, though. I felt a pang of guilt at not having been able to help more. That's what you get when you're weak. You're the one falling to the ground instead of fighting back.

Dylan looked back at me once, quickly, meeting my eyes only for a fleeting second before walking away with his friend, Eric, and the jocks, but it was enough for me to see the bruise on his left temple and his bloodied lower lip.

The guilt in me kept intensifying as I waited along with Dylan's friends outside of the Principal's office. I had wanted to go inside with them, knowing that I had been the one who had started the fight by provoking the jocks, but one of Dylan's friends had stopped me and told me it was probably better if I waited outside.

"You're Rhea, right? I've seen you around but I don't think we've ever spoken," one of Dylan's friends suddenly broke the silence. "I'm Chad, by the way. And that's my friend Nate."

I looked at him and thought back but couldn't recall ever seeing him or his friend before.

"Yeah, I've seen you guys around too," I lied with a shy smile. For a moment I thought they were going to blame me for what I had gotten their friends into and braced for it.

"That was really brave of you what you did back there," Chad smiled at me, taking me by surprise.

"Yeah dude, it was awesome. I would totally pay to see you do that again," Nate laughed and Chad laughed along with him.

"Although to tell you the truth," Nate added, leaving the joke aside. "I thought you were dead meat when you did that. I don't think Brandon would've cared that you are a girl, he looked pissed." After a pause he added, "Not a surprise, though, I hadn't taken a single sip of my soup because it was so hot. It must have really burned him. If Dylan's hadn't stepped up..."

"Yeah man, it really shocked me what Dylan did, it was completely out of character for him."

I realized they were right. If Dylan hadn't stood up and shielded me from that asshole Rick, only God knew what would've been of me. That hadn't even crossed my mind when I emptied the hot soup on Rick's face. I had been so driven by anger that my brain had been completely clouded.

"What are you of Dylan, anyway? He wouldn't do that for just anyone," Chad asked, and they both looked at me with curiosity.

"I..." I began, surprised to feel myself blushing. Seeing this, both Chad and Nate smiled widely. "No, it's not like that at all! He's just my English project partner!" My blushing intensified. I didn't feel anything for Dylan, but for some reason couldn't stop the blood from flooding my cheeks.

Just then we heard the door open and we all shifted our attention to it. I hoped that the blushing would hurry to leave my cheeks.

Rick was the first to come out, followed by his three jock friends, and I instinctively took a step back. He looked at me once and I could see the threat in his eyes. If he hadn't had a reason to mess with me before, he did now. He was smiling, though, which made me wonder what in the world was going through his head. He did have dry blood in his nose and a slightly bruised lip, and I wondered if it had been Dylan who did that to him.

It took Eric and Dylan a few more minutes to get out, and I deeply hoped that they weren't going to get a suspension or something worse. I didn't know what the penalty for getting into a fight was and hoped they would be let go with a warning.

When they finally walked out of the Principal's office, both Chad and Nate hurried to them to see how they were. I stayed where I was, feeling out of place. These weren't my friends and I was to blame for whatever consequence they got. I decided to walk away quietly before getting their attention. Sure enough, it didn't work.

I felt a hand fall over my shoulder and turned around to see Eric. "Thanks for that," he said.

"I'm sorry, I-"

"Sorry? No man, I mean it. Thanks to you we had the chance to land a fist on those dickheads. You don't know how long we've been wanting to do that," he assured me, smiling like he has just had the best time of his life. Looking at him, he was even more bruised than Dylan.

I shook my head in disbelief. "You guys almost got yourselves killed, yet you enjoyed it."

They all laughed and I narrowed my eyes at them.

We began walking away, not wanting to be close to the Principal's office a second more. As I walked besides them they were laughing and joking about what had happened. I wasn't paying attention, I kept quiet waiting to the perfect moment to escape.

"Hey, Rhea, what are you doing after school?" Chad suddenly asked and I looked at him in surprise. My eyes then met with Dylan's and we both quickly looked away from each other.

"I mean, we're filming a movie for our Theater project. It would be cool if you appeared in it too."

"Sure, she'd play a great hitman, even I wouldn't mess with her," Eric joked and nudged me with his shoulder.

"Hitman?" I asked, confused.

"Or maybe she could play as the damsel in distress and have Dylan save her and-Ouch!" Nate started but then Dylan slapped him over the head.

I was surprised to find myself chuckling. "I would love to, but I can't. My brother needs my car today and will kill me if I don't bring it home on time."

They nodded in understanding and continued talking among each other when Dylan's words cut through the air.

"I wouldn't mind driving you."

We all looked at him in surprise. He wasn't looking at me, and for a moment I almost thought I saw him blush, although it was unclear due to the bruise in his temple.

"Thanks," I said, my eyes on him, and this time he did meet my eyes. I couldn't believe I had once been scared of him. Looking at him now, I realized he was actually a good guy. I wasn't so sure about the Hitman movie, but I knew this was a perfect chance to talk with him about our project.